The present invention relates generally to the field of multilayer computing, and more particularly to orchestrating resources between layers in a multilayer computing environment.
Cloud computing is known. Cloud computing is the delivery of computing as a service rather than a product, whereby shared resources, software, and information are provided to computers and other devices as a utility over a network (typically the Internet). Cloud computing environments typically deliver resources over a plurality of abstraction layers where each layer is customized to deliver a specific set of functionality and implementation details for that functionality are hidden from the other layers (or “levels”). One known cloud computing task is orchestration, which involves the automatic arranging, coordinating, and/or managing of resources across abstraction levels in a cloud computing environment.
One problem in the cloud computing field (or, more broadly, in the field of multilayer computing environments) is the difficulty in orchestrating operations to be performed on individual layers of a multi-layer application stack. This is due, at least in part, to the fact that the amount of information passed between layers is limited, with many implementation details hidden from different layers. Some existing solutions utilize applications and/or services that traverse the layers of a multi-layer stack in order to gather information from and perform operations on each layer; however, these solutions are inefficient and typically involve a high amount of resource overhead.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,843,633 (“CLOUD-BASED RESOURCE IDENTIFICATION AND ALLOCATION”, hereinafter “Eriksson”) discloses a system, a method, and computer readable media for identifying resources to implement a service in a cloud computing environment. As indicated in the Abstract, Eriksson “analyze[s] a cloud's ability to support a desired service while maintaining separation between the cloud's logical layers.” Furthermore, “given a list of resources need to implement a target service, a hierarchical plan may be generated. The plan may then be used by each layer to track and record the availability of various possible layer-specific resource selections.”
Non-Patent Literature Kousiouris et al. (“TRANSLATION OF APPLICATION-LEVEL TERMS TO RESOURCE LEVEL ATTRIBUTES ACROSS THE CLOUD STACK LAYERS”, hereinafter “Kousiouris”) discloses “a multi-layer ecosystem” where “the exchange of information between the entities located in different layers is difficult for technical and business reasons.” Kousiouris proposes “a generic approach . . . based on Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs),” applying ANNs “in order to solve this problem, through directly converting the application specific SLA terms to resource attributes.”